Phoenix recently honored a group of local restaurant owners who used grants from the city to reduce food waste in their kitchens and the community.
Kailey Mullis, the lead on Project REDUCE with Phoenix’s Office of Environmental Programs, said participants each worked closely with a professional chef and city staff to find innovative and sometimes unexpectedly simple ways they can prevent food from being wasted in the first place.
“Every year, Phoenix generates around 270,000 tons of food waste and about 69,000 tons of that is generated from restaurants,” said Mullis. “That makes restaurants the second-largest producer of food waste in our city right after households.”
The city of Phoenix, she said, was able to support restaurant owners by adding monetary grants in the second phase.
Fair Trade Café owner Stephanie Vasquez said it can give them the financial breathing room and opportunity to step back, pause and assess.
“The external environment will always impact us,” Vasquez said. “But if we're very clear on what we are doing, this is where entrepreneurs — this is where we work the best. We innovate.”
She’s excited to further show how easy and accessible doing your part can be, whether you’re a business owner or not.
“I've been in food and beverage for over 17 years, so I've got to watch as consumers evolve,” said Vasquez. “And really, they want an experience and they want a purpose and they want to be tied to a mission. So in my opinion, if you're mission-driven and you're purpose-driven, your consumer and your customer is going to support you.”
Vasquez hopes to start seeing wider use of practices like separating waste. At Fair Trade, she said the result is sending less than a bag of garbage to the landfill at the end of every day.
Lyndelle Sanjuanero recalled being encouraged to think more critically about inventory challenges as the owner and head chef at Olla Olla Crepes.
Like when she bought enough blueberries to cater for close to 200 people.
“No one ordered blueberries,” she remembered with a laugh. “I had a bunch of blueberries left over.”
So, after consulting chef Chris Lenza with the program, she came up with what they served at the recent celebration: “Our house-made blueberry sauce that happened from that reduced waste program, dusted with powdered sugar on our beautiful crepes.”
After reducing the six-page menu to one, she’s been able to hire one part-time and three full-time employees.
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